We are now at the top 20 survivor seasons! All of the remaining seasons brought at least something to the table worth keeping so far despite the negatives. This next season had a few twists that weren't popular but I believe there were positives to this one. This season is:
COOK ISLANDS!
Figure it was time to eliminate this season. This season really gets killed unfairly imo. It has a lot more positives than it gets credit for. First of all, I really don't understand the hate for the race tribes. I actually thought it was one of the most interesting ways to divide tribes we've seen on survivor. Think about it. It gave more minorities a chance to play when we might not have even gotten half of the minorities on a normal season. Also, I believe this added an additional social element to the season by seeing if minorities would stick together and how people would judge by stereotypes. People said it was segregation but I call bullshit. It's not segregation if all 4 tribes had the equal opportunity of winning. Another positive to this season was Billy. Easily one of the best early boots in survivor history as a character and his love for Candice will forever be remembered. This season also had one of the biggest underdog stories in survivor history and well, I'm a sucker for those. Candice and Jonathon flip on Aitu to make it 8-4 Raro. Things look bleak for Aitu. They win 2 clutch immunities to at least give themselves a fighting chance. People can say Yul's idol was overpowered but if they had lost even 1 of those 2 challenges, the idol would've been a non-factor. Then in the merge, Yul's pitch to Penner was pretty smart. Penner was foolish to believe he would actually get voted out and Yul uses that to get him to flip. One big positive is that I found the battle between Yul vs. Ozzy great for the win. People forget Yul was trying to get him out as soon as he lost so Ozzy did have a few clutch immunities and only lost 1 challenge. It was the ultimate battle between strategic god and physical god. That set up a pretty entertaining FTC and vote reveal with Yul showing social/strategic beats physical. A couple bonuses. I found the tiebreaker challenge between Becky and Sundra to be very entertaining. I might be in the minority here but I just found it hilarious to watch the 2 sidekicks battle it out for third place. Also you might've hated the HII, but Yul majorly contributed to the HII's rules we all know and love today so we should take that out of this season.
But of course, there are reasons why this season is only #20. First off, I hated the timing of this tribe swap. We had just come off 2 pretty entertaining tribals from these tribes. Why not let it ride a little longer? I would've like to have seen Aitu have to be pressured to win and not let their throwing of a challenge backfire. Plus you blow up your whole tribe theme after just 2 episodes. That's something I have a problem with. I won't sit here and say Raro got robbed though. They had their opportunity to strike in f9 by voting out 1 of the girls and/or Penner not being stupid enough to flip. They just executed their gameplay horribly. I will admit finding out it's a final 3 in the middle of the season is not fair though and probably ruined what would've been an epic final battle between Yul and Ozzy. Another negative is that there really wasn't good gameplay outside of Yul. I really can't think of anybody from this season that made a really good strategic decision besides him. The post-merge play was pathetic from his competition. Whether it was Raro's whole f9 play, Penner flipping in the first place and Yul's alliance refusing to vote him to take out the HII. Not to mention Aitu throwing immunity to take out Billy. That really backfired for everybody in that tribe except Ozzy since they all lost a possible ally.
A little underrated season overall but still had plenty of flaws to be ranked this low.
Stay tuned for #19! Hint- a season after Heroes vs. Villains
28. Nicaragua
27. Redemption Island
26. South Pacific
25. One World
24. Thailand
23. Caramoan
22. All Stars
21. China
20. Cook Islands
Remaining Seasons:
Borneo
Australian Outback
Africa
Marquesas
Amazon
Pearl Islands
Vanuatu
Palau
Guatemala
Exile Island
Fiji
Micronesia
Gabon
Tocantins
Samoa
Heroes vs. Villains
Phillipines
Blood vs. Water
Cagayan
Dinosauro27 I kind of left the bottle twist out on purpose because I thought I covered my opinion on that when I talked about how Raro completely blew the vote in f9. I don't see that as a big negative to the season. While unfair for Raro, it did make the season more interesting while still giving Raro a chance to succeed.
